A native top predator relies on exotic prey inside a protected area: The puma and the introduced ungulates in Central Argentina

Martínez, Juan Ignacio Zanón; Santillán, Miguel Ángel; Sarasola, José Hernán; Travaini, Alejandro

doi:10.1016/j.jaridenv.2016.06.015

Cited by 11 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…We used camera traps and site-occupancy modeling to study the effect of several factors related with human disturbance, landscape composition, degree of fragmentation, and intespecific interactions (i.e., the presence of one potential competitor, the Pampas fox, Lycalopex gymnocercus , and one predator, the puma, Puma concolor ) on the habitat use of wild boar. We chose these species to study intespecific interactions because the puma is the top predator of the mammal community in our study area and has been shown that can prey on wild boars in the Espinal [ 47 ] whereas the Pampas fox, like the wild boar, is also a habitat and dietary generalist [ 48 ]. Additionally, we described the daily activity pattern of the species and we studied the level of overlap with its potential competitor and predator.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Summer habitat use and activity patterns of wild boar Sus scrofa in rangelands of central Argentina

et al. 2018

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Biological invasions are one of the main components of human-caused global change and their negative impact on invaded ecosystems have long been recognized. Invasive mammals, in particular, can threaten native biodiversity and cause economic impacts in the region where they are introduced, often through a wide range of conflicts with humans. Although the wild boar, Sus scrofa, is considered by the IUCN as one of the 100 invasive species most damaging to biodiversity in the world, in Argentina there have only been a few studies focused on its ecology with most of them conducted in protected areas. In this study, we evaluated the effect of several factors related with human disturbance, landscape composition, degree of fragmentation and the presence of a potential competitor and a predator on the habitat use of wild boar using data from camera traps and site-occupancy modeling. Additionally, we described the daily activity pattern of the species and we studied the level of overlap with both a potential competitor and a predator. The sampling effort totaled 7,054 camera trap days. Farm density, proportion of shrubland and proportion of grassland with bushes were the detection variables included in the most supported model whereas proportion of grassland and capture rate of the Pampas fox Lycalopex gymnocercus were the occupancy variables included in the most supported model. However, the proportion of grassland was the only variable that showed statistically significant support in the averaged model, indicating that habitat use of wild boar in this area was significantly negatively affected by the level of grass cover. Wild boars were mostly nocturnal, with more activity between 21:00 and 3:00 and a peak around midnight. Wild boars showed a high level of overlap with the activity pattern of the Pampas fox and a low overlap with the activity pattern of the puma Puma concolor. Despite wild boar being introduced in Argentina a few decades ago, this study is the first landscape-scale research carried out in an agricultural landscape in Argentina and the first one based on camera-trapping data. Our study contributes valuable information that could be used to design strategies to reduce wild boar population or to minimize the damage caused by this invasive species in Argentina.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Summer habitat use and activity patterns of wild boar Sus scrofa in rangelands of central Argentina

et al. 2018

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“…These findings are counterintuitive because pumas could potentially predate on wild boars. However, previous studies on the food habits of puma in South America indicate that the consumption of wild boars is usually marginal, occurring in sites associated with reduction of natural prey [44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55]. Moreover, the latency observed between records of puma after wild boar records was more than a week and was longer when assessed vice-versa.…”

Section: Plos Onementioning

confidence: 99%

Who’s afraid of the big bad boar? Assessing the effect of wild boar presence on the occurrence and activity patterns of other mammals

et al. 2020

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Wild boar are considered one the world's worst invasive species and linked to biodiversity loss, competition for resources, predation of native species, and habitat modifications. In this study, we use camera traps to evaluate whether the invasive wild boar had an effect on the medium-sized mammal community of a protected area in southern Brazil. Based on photographic records, we evaluated whether the presence and relative abundance of wild boar was associated with a decrease in diversity or change in activity of medium-sized mammals. All comparisons were made between samples where wild boar were present or absent. The records of each camera during a season were considered a sample. The wild boar was the fourth most common species in the study area being present in 7.8% of the photographic records. The species richness of mammals was not negatively affected by the occurrence of wild boar and most common species did not exhibit changes in the daily activity pattern. However, we recorded an increase in the time elapsed between an observation of wild boar and the record of the next species relative to the average latency period observed among other mammalian species. This average latency period was similar to that observed in the case of large predators such as Puma, and its increase could be reflective partly of the avoidance of native species to wild boar. Nevertheless, our results show that the effect of invasive wild boar on the mammal community is not large as expected.

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“…Human interference promotes a puma source–sink population dynamic between protected and productive areas (game reserves and cattle ranches), where they are hunted as a trophy (Zanón Martínez et al. 2016 a , b ) or pest species (Guerisoli et al. 2017).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Pumas are still often poached as trophy animals in game reserves (see Zanón Martínez et al. 2016 a , b for details).…”

Section: Study Areamentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing carnivore spatial co‐occurrence and temporal overlap in the face of human interference in a semiarid forest

Martínez

Seoane

Kelly

et al. 2021

Ecological Applications

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Apex predators drive top-down effects in ecosystems and the loss of such species can trigger mesopredator release. This ecological process has been well documented in humanmodified small areas, but for management and conservation of ecological communities, it is important to know which human factors affect apex predator occurrence and which mediate mesopredators release at large scales. We hypothesized that mesopredators would avoid spatial and temporal overlap with the apex predator, the puma; but that human perturbations (i.e., cattle raising and trophy hunting) would dampen top-down effects and mediate habitat use. We installed 16 camera traps in each of 45, 10 × 10 km grid cells in the Caldén forest region of central Argentina resulting in 706 total stations covering 61,611 km 2 . We used single-season occupancy and two-species co-occurrence models and calculated the species interaction factor (SIF) to explore the contributions of habitat, biotic, and anthropic variables in explaining cooccurrence between carnivore pairs. We also used kernel density estimation techniques to analyze temporal overlap in activity patterns of the carnivore guild. We found that puma habitat use increased with abundance of large prey and with proximity to protected areas. Geoffroy's cats and skunks spatially avoided pumas and this effect was strong and mediated by distance to protected areas and game reserves, but pumas did not influence pampas fox and pampas cat space use. At medium and low levels of puma occupancy, we found evidence of spatial avoidance between three pairs of mesocarnivores. All predators were mostly nocturnal and crepuscular across seasons and mesopredators showed little consistent evidence of changing activity patterns with varying levels of puma occupancy or human interference. We found potential for mesopredator release at large scale, especially on the spatial niche axis. Our results suggest that a combination of interacting factors, in conjunction with habitat features and intervening human activities, may make mesopredator release unlikely or difficult to discern at broad scales. Overall, we believe that promoting the creation of new protected areas linked by small forest patches would likely lead to increased predator and prey abundances, as well as the interactions among carnivores inside and outside of protected areas.

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A native top predator relies on exotic prey inside a protected area: The puma and the introduced ungulates in Central Argentina

Cited by 11 publications

References 16 publications

Summer habitat use and activity patterns of wild boar Sus scrofa in rangelands of central Argentina

Summer habitat use and activity patterns of wild boar Sus scrofa in rangelands of central Argentina

Who’s afraid of the big bad boar? Assessing the effect of wild boar presence on the occurrence and activity patterns of other mammals

Assessing carnivore spatial co‐occurrence and temporal overlap in the face of human interference in a semiarid forest

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